


The Price of a Home

by hbxplain



Series: More Lives Than One [3]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), More Lives Than One, Original Work
Genre: Blood, Furia's Backstory, Furia's POV, Furia's Tattoos, Gen, Genasi, Mingling With the Wind, Scar Tattoos, Sibling Bonding, Written By Storm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2020-09-28 22:22:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20433428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hbxplain/pseuds/hbxplain
Summary: They just want a place to call home.





	The Price of a Home

**Author's Note:**

> Another reminder: this is for our DnD campaign MLTO, and the full campaign can be found on the wattpad account "stormcause"!

It is a cold morning up in the mountainous forest, and the sun’s rays have only just started to hit the very highest leaves of the trees, but the camp hidden in the forest, made up of tents and a campfire ring, is already awake and active despite the early hour. There are perhaps three dozen people in the tribe and the only common feature among them is their medium blue skin and tattoos that decorate their cheek, neck, arms and sometimes legs. Some are tall, some are short, some are round, some thin, some with skin as smooth as a snake’s and some with crystals or lumps growing out of their skin.

Out of the forest, not too long after the camp stirs awake, a smaller group of these blue people emerge, about seven of them, arranged in a circle. In their middle are two children, one in his late teens and the other in her early teens. A tall woman leads them, with long hair that is almost white in colour. The two children glance around as best as they can with their escort surrounding them.

“So… does this mean that we’re part of the tribe?” the boy asks hesitantly, seeming to carry on from an earlier conversation.

“Not yet,” the tall woman says in Common, her voice heavily accented. She turns to face them as she walks and points to her right cheek, where a squiggly tattoo lies. “This is our mark. It unites us, marks us as belonging to the tribe.”

The children glance around and see that all of their escorts have the same tattoo and from their glances around, so does everyone else in the camp. The tall woman stops in front of an older blue woman who sits on a log, carving something into a long strip of wood. The two speak rapidly for a few moments in a guttural language and the woman gives a nod and starts to clean her blade.

“Cirri will give you your… tattoos,” the tall woman says, momentarily searching for the word in Common.

“Woah woah wait,” the boy says, backing up and putting an arm around the female, who is so similar to him in appearance that they must be siblings. “You’re not going to-”

“To be part of the tribe, you must have your tattoo,” the woman says sternly.

The girl huddles closer to brother, her eyes fixed on the dagger. She doesn’t say anything, but he can feel her trembling slightly. He seems to weigh up his options very carefully, his eyes full of concern as he stares at the knife, but he finally turns to his sister. “It’ll be okay,” he says quietly.

* * *

It _hurt_.

The girl didn’t remember much of it, just vague impressions; her being held down so that she didn’t move and something sharp digging into her skin and it hurting and that was it. She only realised later that she had passed out and she wakes up in a very unfamiliar place, small and warm, with a brown fabric over her and on either side. She turns her head as she wakes up, realising she is lying down and sitting next to her, his knees drawn up to his chest, is her brother, Silex.

“Are you okay?” he asks as soon as she is awake.

“I think so,” she replies, sitting up a little.

Almost instantly, her eyes become fixed on his face. His right cheek has the same squiggly line as that tall woman from before, and it’s a darker blue than the rest of his skin but it’s tinged red too. His neck has a darker tattoo as well; two half arrowheads. They look wrong on him, unnatural, and she doesn’t like it.

It takes her a few moments to realise that he’s looking at her too and he reaches out and gently touches her cheek. That’s when she notices that her skin is stinging slightly. Silex takes his hand away and he sighs.

“I’m sorry Fu,” he says quietly. “I didn’t realise…”

What he didn’t realise, she never learnt, because Furia cuts him off with a hug. He hugs back, tight and silent.

“We need these people,” he says finally, almost as if he’s trying to convince himself as well as comfort his sister. “They can look after us, keep us safe.”

Furia nods, but she doesn’t speak what she’s thinking; _But you always have kept us safe. What’s different now?_

* * *

Buran is the one who teaches Furia the different weapons the tribe carries, giving her the basic instruction in each before moving onto the next. Silex is taught by Bise, another Air Genasi, so the two don’t see each other much during their early days at the tribe. Much to Buran and Bise’s surprise, the two children - who are much younger than anyone else in the tribe - already have a nodding acquaintance with most of the weapons they are shown and they pick up on the skills quickly. Although neither of them have much stamina or strength, they are lithe and quick on their feet and most importantly, are willing to learn.

“So,” Buran says, speaking Primordial to the young girl in front of her after the two had just finished training with spears. “Which weapon will you choose to use?” For that is the way of the tribe; you choose a weapon to be yours and you master it until you are the best.

Furia hesitates, glancing at Silex who stands beside her. On his upper right arm, a new tattoo had been carved into his skin; a large spiral S shape with a dot in the two curves. He gives her a small nudge with his elbow.

“You’re good with a spear,” he says quietly. “And it’s got lots of uses.”

“It’s hard to throw,” she answers. “And the wood hurts my hand.”

“Then a bow. You saw how impressed Buran was when she saw you use it.”

“But I like using the sword,” Furia tells him. “And daggers, I find them easy too.” She glances at the tattoo on his arm. Silex has already chosen his weapon; daggers. She had seen him training against Bise with them and she had been instantly impressed. And maybe a bit jealous too.

“You’re better with a bow,” he says. When she goes to refuse, he quickly adds, even more quietly so that others don’t hear, “Elves use bows, Fu. It’s their best weapon. You’d be good at it.”

That makes her hesitate as he knew it would and after a few seconds, she nods in agreement. But Silex never tells her his real reason for wanting her to use a bow; so that if she does ever get into a fight, she stays out of danger; so that if someone tries to attack, she doesn’t get hurt.

And so the same things happen as on the first day. Furia is taken to Cirri, who nods and tells Furia where to sit and to put her left hand, palm down, on a roughly hewn table. She gives the young girl a stick to bite down on and gives her arm a little pat, saying “This is going to hurt and there’s not much I can do about it, but try not to move your hand too much, okay?”

It seems to hurt more this time than the others did, but at least she manages to remain conscious. She sees through tears the knife carefully trace a pattern through the skin in her hand, carving a line that goes up the back of her palm, curving just under her knuckles with lines twisting around them. She sees her blood run, wiped away each time by a cloth that just makes the cuts sting more, and then her hand is turned over and the tattoo is carved around her wrist, locking it together like it is securing her place in the tribe.

Or like it is a chain.

Then the knife is taken away and something is rubbed into the cuts that stings and taints it a darker blue than the rest of her skin. Almost straight afterwards, something cool is pressed onto her aching hand and the stick is taken away and she takes what felt like her first pain-free breath.

“You did very well,” Cirri says, a smile on her face as she pats Furia’s arm slightly. “Keep this moss on, it helps with the stinging.”

Furia nods a little, pressing the green-brown moss hard onto her hand. She stumbles away a few steps, dizzy from what she just went through. A breeze blows gently through the camp and it clears her mind a bit as she pauses, looking around the camp. They had moved location again - they always moved, every other day, hence why they slept in tents - and from here, she can _just_ see two rivers in the north which run close together at first, but wind further and further apart the longer they run.

She glances around for Silex almost from instinct, but he had left when she was being taken to Cirri. He is going to have his _zaçot_ in a few days, a test, to earn his place as an adult in the tribe and get his adult tattoo. Bise said that he needs to practice Mingling with the Wind.

Furia sighs a little, looking far into the distance, focusing on the feeling of the breeze in her hair and against her skin rather than her thoughts or what she sees or the pain in her hand. Things will be okay. She has a place here, she will settle in. After all, she is an oxçu now; an archer.


End file.
